The Emotional Pattern That Predicts Career Failure - Alex Hormozi
CChris Williamson
ManagementSmall Business/StartupsMental Health
Transcript
00:00:00because you feel bad, it means that the path that you're on, like you need to change something.
00:00:05And so it's equal opposite, which is like, okay, if we know that we're on the path getting kicked
00:00:09in the nuts right now, and I know I'm on my 17th or a hundredth podcast, and I'm still not like a
00:00:13millionaire yet. I, I have not achieved what I want yet. It does not mean that I have to change
00:00:19course. But earlier on, you said that bad feelings, feeling bad are important to update
00:00:28the way that you're approaching this situation. So how do you distinguish between the two?
00:00:32No, and that's, and that's, and I'd say what you, what you hit on is, is the, is the crux of it,
00:00:35which is judgment, which is like, and this is one of the hardest ones is like, how do you help
00:00:39someone recognize patterns of when you need to, basically it's the eternal question of when do
00:00:45I push and when do I pivot, right? When do I push through the hardship versus when do I adjust?
00:00:49Am I giving up on this set in the gym because I'm being a pussy or am I giving up because I'm about
00:00:53to injure myself? Yeah. And so I pivot. I like that. Yeah. And I've, and I've worked with this a lot
00:00:57because it's a pretty classic entrepreneurship issue of like, do I have product market fit or
00:01:01like, do I need to keep pushing? You know, like, you know, where am I just trying to push up a hill?
00:01:04Um, is that if one of the fundamental assumptions that you began your quest with
00:01:09has been proven untrue based on the feedback, then that is where pivoting makes sense.
00:01:15So if you said like, I think that I'm going to create, um, a doggy skateboard, because I think
00:01:21that, um, a lot of dog owners will want to buy skateboards for their dog. Um, would be like,
00:01:27and I believe that the percentage, like, and I wouldn't make a, you know, a billion dollars doing
00:01:30this. Um, that would mean that there's this size of the market. This percentage needs to be the
00:01:34take rate in order for me to get that, that market share. It's like, okay, if, if I talk to a hundred
00:01:39dog owners and none of them want to buy my, my doggy skateboard, I would not say that is a push
00:01:44situation. I would say that is a pivot situation because our fundamental assumption that we started
00:01:48this quest with is false. And so we need to take that feedback and then pivot. If, as we're going
00:01:55through, they're saying, uh, I maybe, but like, I don't know what you have in your hands. What
00:02:01the hell is that? So it's like, the assumption is not proven, but it's more of an execution
00:02:04issue. And so it's like, okay, I just need to get better. I need to push through, but I'm
00:02:08saying it is definitely one of the harder, um, lines to, to know, like where, when should
00:02:12I push? When should I pivot? Uh, what lesson do I learn from losing?
00:02:16Hmm. Because losing, losing teaches you shit and we just need to make sure that we learn
00:02:23the right thing. Like teaching will occur. Yes. Whether you take it away or not is up
00:02:30to you. It's the, it's the, um, I, I hired my first employee and he was a fuck ass. Therefore
00:02:36all employees suck. Right. So like losing will teach you something. It's just want to make
00:02:40sure that we learn the right lesson. I feel like this is a justification for making early
00:02:44decisions as right as possible to try and avoid that PTSD of it's far easier to learn something
00:02:53than it is to unlearn something. Probably a hundred times easier to learn something than
00:02:57it is to unlearn something. If you've drilled a particular habit, particular bad habit, if
00:03:01you have come up with a mode of interacting with your employees or the world, because all
00:03:06of your employees, the first three employees, you get all of them fucked you over. And then
00:03:10finally you get to the fourth, you have to unlearn all of the compensatory mechanisms that
00:03:13you built on the first three. Now that you've got someone who's worthy of that and you're
00:03:17restricting their progress, you're slowing everything down. You're being hypervigilant.
00:03:21It doesn't feel like a good place to work. Try and make your early decisions. Right.
00:03:25Yeah. Changing a behavior with a long history of reinforcement is harder than changing one
00:03:30with no history of such a hardcore behaviorist. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's the only thing that's
00:03:34made sense to me in the world. Like it's, I mean, it's, it's skinner-pilled.
00:03:38I mean, it's just, I don't even, it's just my reality. So I'll say differently, like many
00:03:48people do not get what they want. They look up at their lives and they're like, this is
00:03:52not what I want. And so if you don't have what you want, it means that the model that
00:03:56you view the world through is incorrect, or you have the correct model and the incorrect
00:04:00variables are insufficient variables. It's basically all it is.
00:04:03And so for me, the more I have looked purely at inputs and outputs, the more I've gotten
00:04:12my predictions correct. And so I have been super reinforced for using this style of, of,
00:04:18of thinking. And so I do it more. And so it's just, and like, I, I, I read some of my old
00:04:23stuff and I'm like, oh man, like I could have said this in half as much words if I'd now,
00:04:26I, cause it's understanding why, like at the most basic level, it's just understanding
00:04:32why. Um, I'll give an example. And I think this is why the vast majority of the world like
00:04:36walks around confused, which is I don't have what I want. That didn't go the way I expected.
00:04:41She took that worse than I thought. So you're, you're constantly surprised by reality. And
00:04:45so in, in a simple sentence, like Johnny stole because he's dishonest, right? Most people would
00:04:52nod their heads and be like, yeah, Johnny stole because he's dishonest. But we say, what does
00:04:55dishonest mean? Dishonest means it's a label, right? That we ascribe to somebody who does a
00:05:00series of different behaviors, one of which is stealing. And so if we were to restate that
00:05:05sentence with the broken down definition, it would then be Johnny stole because he's the type of
00:05:08person who steals, which is circular and makes no sense. Because the real reason that Johnny stole
00:05:15is because he's been reinforced for stealing in the past, or he saw someone who got reinforced for
00:05:20stealing and then modeled their behavior. That is why Johnny stole. And so because of that basic
00:05:24misunderstanding, most people have these words that they use to explain the reality that they
00:05:28don't actually understand. And as a result, reality fools them more often than it should.
00:05:32He was rewarded for it or he was punished for doing the opposite of it.
00:05:34Exactly. And so, um, that basic that like, and that what I just explained is, is the difference
00:05:41between description and explanation, um, which is relatively heady and I think difficult sometimes
00:05:47to grasp, but is at the most basic level, like my worldview, this is what happened. This is why it
00:05:53happened. Why? Yeah. And so from that one kind of basic understanding, everything else can kind of
00:05:59pretty much get laddered up. And so, um, said differently, if, if I wanted to tell a child get good at
00:06:11basketball, right? Um, I would not tell him get better at basketball because a five-year-old would be
00:06:20like, I don't know how to do that. What does that mean? So I'd be like, okay, well, let's break it
00:06:24down. We've got dribbling, passing, shooting. Okay. Do that a little bit closer, but they still
00:06:28probably don't know how to, if I say, go get better at dribbling, passing, and shooting still can't do
00:06:32anything with that until eventually be like, okay, passing. So I want you to take a step with your left
00:06:36foot towards the person. And I want you to extend your elbows and finish with your thumbs down. Um, and if
00:06:43the ball goes towards them in the direction that they're running and they catch it, you've passed
00:06:46successfully. And then I would repeat that chain of events until eventually they would understand that
00:06:49that chain of behaviors equals passing. And if they do it a lot and they hit the target many times,
00:06:54they would be good at passing. And we'd repeat that all the way down until they're good at passing,
00:06:57dribbling, shooting, et cetera. And then eventually we'd describe them as a good basketball player.
00:07:01But that basic unbundling and rebundling of terms is why I think the vast majority of people are
00:07:06wildly, um, confused by what's going on around them is that someone says, why don't you love me?
00:07:13And he's like, what are you talking about? He's like, I pay the bills. I take out the
00:07:16trash. Like, you know, like, what do you want from me? And she says, uh, like, you don't tell me I'm
00:07:23pretty. You don't hug me. Uh, like, you don't listen to me when I, when I, you don't ever, never
00:07:28ask me how my day's going. And it's because for her, she defines love in these behaviors and he
00:07:34defines love in these behaviors. And so then they fight forever rather than just saying like, what
00:07:37does that mean? What does that mean? Um, we had, uh, we had two employees that were arguing about
00:07:42something, uh, at acquisition and one was like, Hey, can you, um, I would be fine if you were just
00:07:47like kind and polite to me. And, um, I was like, okay, what does that mean? And, uh, there was
00:07:55obviously a moment of like hesitation there. Cause it's like, okay, so you want the other person to
00:07:58guess what you think in your mind means good behavior, but you've never articulated it. And so
00:08:02you want them to guess and somehow get it right. And so finally it just was like, can you ask more
00:08:06questions rather than making more statements? And the other person was like, yeah, sure. It's like,
00:08:10great. But that basic thing now, and they're fine now and everything's great. And so, but like,
00:08:15this is why I view the world and behavior because I have wanted things, but I didn't know how to get
00:08:22them, which is happens in reality. And so as long as I live in reality, I prefer to define things
00:08:30through reality. And then reality tends to behave far more as I predicted it would on the, I want you
00:08:37to do this, but I didn't tell you it's that Neil Strauss line, unspoken expectations are premeditated
00:08:43resentment. You do this thing that I didn't tell you to do. Yeah. Probably not deliberately. Cause I
00:08:50think a lot of people do it not on purpose, of course, but it's a, uh, unconscious premeditated
00:08:56resentment. The, the investment that you are making will be a resentment in future that you aren't
00:09:00aware is about to come about. Yeah. Another thing on the, uh, people's map of reality is inaccurate.
00:09:07I think one of the most obvious realizations that you can have when you hear somebody who complains a
00:09:13lot is that their framework of reality is incorrect. Oh, by a mile. A complaint is you saying,
00:09:20why is reality not delivering that to me, which I anticipated and reality doesn't care. Reality is
00:09:27just going to continue to deliver to you that, which it is giving. Why is there all of this traffic
00:09:32on the way to work? There shouldn't be all of this traffic. I didn't anticipate all of this traffic.
00:09:36Yeah. I assumed there wouldn't be traffic. Reality disagreed with me. Reality is not wrong.
00:09:42It's undefeated. Reality is undefeated. Yeah. It's a million and oh, a million TKOs.
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